Oppositionist, that is, a criminal

Deputy of the Yekaterinburg City Duma, leader of the local branch of Yabloko, Maxim Petlin, was accused of extorting three million rubles. On February 22, he was detained, his office and apartment were searched, and a criminal case was opened against him. FSB officers detained him, roughly twisted his hands, and he spent the entire night of February 23 in the office of the Investigative Committee.

Petlin organized the “Strategy-31” actions in Yekaterinburg. His associates believe that the detention of the leader of the local Yabloko party is an act of intimidation. They created a committee in support of Petlin and released a statement saying that Petlin is widely known as the organizer of “uncompromising campaigns in support of political prisoners” and actively opposes “corrupt authorities and their accomplices.” The committee accuses the organization of this action of intimidation of the Presidential Plenipotentiary Representative in the Ural Federal District Nikolai Vinnichenko, “who officially coordinates the activities” of local law enforcement agencies.

According to the investigation, Petlin “extorted from a representative of one of the commercial organizations” three million rubles, that is, money on an especially large scale. “However,” the Investigative Committee said in a statement, “when part of the specified sum of money was transferred to him, his illegal actions were stopped by officers of the FSB Directorate for the Sverdlovsk Region.” Activist of the “Defense” movement Evgeny Legin, speaking in defense of Petlin, told Ekho Moskvy that, according to investigators, Petlin allegedly demanded a bribe from a construction company for refusing to protest against the deforestation of the park. Earlier, Petlin’s former assistant Andrei Panteleev was detained, to whom money was allegedly transferred for the deputy. According to the Yabloko website, a representative of the Forum Group construction company handed a package to Panteleev in the office with a request to give it to Petlin, and FSB officers immediately entered the company’s office.

In addition, when representatives of the Public Monitoring Commission of the Sverdlovsk Region Vladimir Shaklein and Vyacheslav Bashkov, during a visit to the temporary detention center where Petlin has been kept since the morning of February 23, approached his cell, investigator Valeria Ushakova stood in front of them and demanded a receipt for non-disclosure of information that the members The deputy can inform the PMC. The observers refused to sign and were not allowed to visit the cell. Shaklein and Bashkov bypassed all the other cells in the temporary detention center, and nowhere did they require receipts from them. Then, nevertheless, they were allowed to look at Petlin

Forum Group planned to build a shopping center on the site of the park on Repin Street. She agreed with the city administration to cut down more than 1,100 trees and shrubs. Petlin and a group of concerned citizens opposed the logging and construction of a shopping center. Finally, as the Yabloko website reports, representatives of Forum Groups offered to sign an agreement with the public, promising to suspend logging and begin a public discussion of the project. Petlin, in turn, agreed not to organize public actions during the negotiations. The agreement was signed on February 22.

Petlin faces up to 15 years in prison.

On February 24, following the results of the court hearing, it was decided that Petlin could be released on the surety of City Duma deputies Nafik Famiev and Ilya Tyshchenko and Regional Duma deputy Evgeniy Artyukh. According to New Region - Yekaterinburg, they guaranteed that Petlin would not hide from the investigation.